i believe that an engaged intellectual is someone who is intensely curious about the world around her, constantly in the act of researching people, herself, and the politics of social interactions and injustices, working as an educator either formally or informally to bring people together for reasons of solidarity, and consciously merging “intellectual” theory and everyday practice in life/pedagogy to work for social change.
i know many teachers who resist the institutional push to create artificial boundaries between what teachers and students know about the injustices of the world outside of school and what teachers and students are supposed to do inside the walls of the classroom. transforming those boundaries into spaces where lives and pedagogies are constructed together in ways that work for social justice is something that can lead to powerful possibilities.
This is a place where former students, current students, and fabulous colleagues can come together to share, question, ramble, and consider critical encounters in education and society. “Engaged Intellectuals” refers to a subject position I believe is available for all educators to merge life and pedagogy as they work for social justice in the classroom, community, and world around us. I hope we can find a way to create a valuable and sustainable network of folks who need support and are energized by knowing that they are not alone.
so glad you did this, steph! and i’m excited to be a part of this thinking, sharing, inquiring community.
I look forward to reading your blog!
Peggy Semingson